[x]

QuicksilverYellow streetlights bleak
wearing necklaces of rain-
pearls against the streak
of finger painted windows
overlaid
with quicksilver brocade
and nests of spider eggs.

Where once this place
was abandoned, in a room
the creak of floor boards
drowned by thunder's boom,
revealed
by shadow and lightning strobe,
paint-by-number puddles trace

around two who sleep sound
in the aftermath
of their heated tryst
that causes the panes
to mist
and condensate.
Moisture trickles down

brittle wallpaper paste
and folds of stained flesh
amidst mottled reflections
as the sound of rumbling
deep
in the sagging rafters
stumbles, tumbli

breaddoctors pure as angels, white as chefs
peruse menus on clipboards,

their exhaustion mouthed in metric
from a graveyard shift cuisine

measuring the flour, cutting off the surplus,
adhering to rules, to rules, to rules-

hospital smocks' mocking exposure
to cold air and latex

the way fatigue sets in when
bilious walls deaden,

bringing on the drone of
fluorescent blood-suckers

as a hypo plunges deep into
a fat vein, pliant and compliant,

to siphon me through the
emptiness outside the box-

a distant voice is counting backwards...
I smell bread baking

little stirrings V: geisha

kimono silks slowly fall
from my bare shoulders
and pool round my feet

waiting with averted eyes
your touch upon pale skin
trembling in your wake

your geisha bows low-
the floor carpeted from a
gentle rain of broken blossoms

serpentPretending to be a lover,
you come to me as a man
to the pomegranate tree,

blind sighted by your hunger
to taste of its
heavy-laden mystery.

Now, a serpent transformed
with darting tongue
sniffing out the promise

of fallen fruit
split by crows taking flight
as you approach

low to the ground, unblinking
stare like tiger's eye
mesmerizing,

when I succumb the weight
of cool scales wrapping round
the membrane, smothering

rubies of luscious red with the
undulations of your legless crawl,

to the heady quench and thirst
between the spongy chambers
of bloodied pith.

Lightthe feeling of
freefalling off the edge
from the test results
on the phone alone-

always knowing that
nothing is certain except
for the bond between
us keeping vigil afar;

he offers to be near
all the same
no matter what that means,
or the sacrifice made-

I'm moved to tears,
how foolish I am
to apologize for the litany
of fears that befall me-

he judges not at all,
yet shames me with
the beauty of his caring,
shushing me when I fret;

I won't look pretty
by the deathwatch light
of a hospital room,
but I'm not there yet;

I'd rather he see me
by the radiance of
a winter's full moon
or a golden afternoon,

crow comes courtingresplendent in a black gloss
of feathered robes...

crow's morning clicks of courtship
echo through downcast mists that
bead upon bowed shoreline willows

and genuflect in the wake
of his purposeful strut
one hesitant step before the next,

his head cocked this way and that,
listening as distant ticks
message back a reply-

the visage of his agenda
suddenly unfolds in a wingspread
that lifts above a watery canvas,

the guttural sound of pulled
stitching sends love notes receding
into estuaries, and ripples

where tadpoles skip and dart
beneath lily pads in the random and
rapid blink of each tiny vortex

Scourgeleaves shuffled along
from breezes gone bitter
scatter
across a river

blackened
with maternal blood
from my thighs that
merge

with the onset
of autumn, and
the scourge
of our union-

clay soil darkened
with cooking oil
and carcasses,
and human waste

decomposing
in the dying light
of day and a life

the way summer
promises,
only to turn away

little stirrings XI: wreckage

rain showers soothe,
leaving reflections
upon my skin

the wreckage
within
untouched, unclean

never mind the pain,
when you are near
how sweet the rain

JupiterI lay, gutted and waiting
for you to respirate my heart
seized in its fatigue
to awaken and return your gifts.

How desperate am I to
stay the course, yearning
to keep you even as I know
I must be set free.

Sliding into the waves of
Jupiter's amber clouds,
my lungs fill with the
heady storm of its red eye

that plunges me into dreams
weighed down beyond the
poisonous burn of muscles,
lulled by a false sense.

And still further, till
oblivion reveals nothing more
than the sulfuric rust

the color of heart chambers
(a deep thrum of ventricles).
The descent seems an eternity

while I hope you'll follow,
pulled by your fear

Epochghostly scatterings of blackbirds-
hallucinations in their wake,
like the low-lying fog
below the clouds

just before rain comes
and plays blues in the streets,
filling the gutters
where uranium fish glow,

while in blows the sweet scent
of new grass and sage, secreted
in the alleys of abandoned chaos
that cover bygone seasons
of attempt and loss-

the baritone of wind through
the nostrils of the old tree
where I stand under its limbs
of sparse buds
(perhaps the last year)

to a chorus of knuckles cracking
from the slow heavy drips on
the hood of my Mackintosh;

a yellow jacket flying amidst
the gray morn

In Praise OfI cannot avert my eyes while
in praise of yours, striving
towards the clearness of your being,

across who's face dances the
blood-red, wine-flames of life
on its skin of gold leaf,

my breath bellows it into
sunsets of a citrus palette,
brushing all forms free of stain,

against which the melodious riot of
existence peals its flute notes
without ever leaving our presence!

wakelow-slung mists
through which pass
ill-fated century ships,
their silks and masts
of silent bellows-

a strike, a note
dull foghorn bloat
belched
from the sea's memory
undone - a lone tugboat

melee of gulls
skim the waves
their cleaved breasts
tinted pink from
night's crescent phase

unraveling
a trail of blood
torn from barnacles
in the wake of
an unsalvageable flood

morning tanka

gazing in a mirror
while you doze,
I'm loath to comb the
morning tangles
from my long dark hair

tanka of transitions

the lanterns of boats
moving through evening mist
become fireflies
moving through evening mist
like the lanterns of boats

hell bentthe lay of rippled satin straps
and cheap store-cut lace
leaves imprints of re-enacted daydreams,

hell bent in the afternoon strains
of jukebox rockabilly
downstairs in the greasy spoon

where music and wooden nickels
play to the smells of drugstore aftershave
and fried onions, up between the
floorboards, saturating the sheets

and the heap of stained underwear,
blending with the taste
of our flesh through nostril rush,

enjoying me the way you would
strips of bacon from the leftover
breakfast platter, washed down
with twice-heated cups of coffee

Browse More Like This

Download File
HTML, 796 bytes more ▶

More from `jade-pandora

Where a Poem Once Wasall I said, all I've ever said
was rotted candied webs and fluff,

embryonic thought, stupefyingly
lightweight, naive and bluff,

I knew the moment I descended
from the feign of high spirits

as your random acts reprimanded
all the tarps of resignation from

highboys and wing chairs, showing
the jest of moldering shutters-

in a season of loons going
dormant, and so too my memory,

always trusting while throwing
caution to winds of extinction

for time to challenge,
rattling in an uneasy truce-

each fortnight remained taut,
reverberating from a pluck

on the rim, snapping loose
to whip violently back

seeking retrib

Kannabisyou've drawn me into your purity
corrupting your harbors until
only I remain pure,
a bitter truth in disbelief-

sub-shadows blurring
become intolerant, the more
voracious your midnights
despite the pleasuring reef-

there's always more that must be
said, too numb and never sure,
intoxicating your devotion;
denial of this grief-

to realize all delusions
while waiting for the answers
that you will never know
from the inhalations of my leaf

little stirrings XVII: reach

scenting the currents
of everything I feel for you
and yet
how delicately fickle

when your lashes and
your fingertips and
your playful tongue
reach out to caress and tickle

songkeep me here with you
even when I'm not near
keep me here with you forever

don't worry that the tide will take me,
my heart beats with the lunar pull

you claim how selfish is your heart
while seeking shellfish in the sand, to

keep me here with you
even when I'm not near
keep me here with you forever

the lazy breezes pull us close
and wash away our footpaths

you tell me listen, hear the song
that comes from memories of me
that reads in every book you have, to

keep me here with you
even when I'm not near
keep me here with you forever

breaddoctors pure as angels, white as chefs
peruse menus on clipboards,

their exhaustion mouthed in metric
from a graveyard shift cuisine

measuring the flour, cutting off the surplus,
adhering to rules, to rules, to rules-

hospital smocks' mocking exposure
to cold air and latex

the way fatigue sets in when
bilious walls deaden,

bringing on the drone of
fluorescent blood-suckers

as a hypo plunges deep into
a fat vein, pliant and compliant,

to siphon me through the
emptiness outside the box-

a distant voice is counting backwards...
I smell bread baking

View Gallery · View Prints

Featured in Groups:

#written-from-within
Written From the Soul

#versebyverse
Verse by Verse Poetry Community

#theWrittenRevolution
The words are the spark.

#LeftHandedArtists
With a common uncommonness.

#The-Poetry-Cafe
Poetry and Writers Welcome!

#Female-Artists
Empowering Women Artists

#HighQualityArt

#Writing-Obsession

Show all (20)

Details

Submitted: September 22, 2008
File Size: 796 bytes

Thumb

Statistics

Comments: 107
Favourites: 62 [who?]
Views: 1,275 (0 today)
Downloads: 37 (0 today)

[x]

River Dream

by `jade-pandora, Sep 22, 2008, 1:28:49 AM
Literature / Poetry / Romantic / General / Free Verse

Where I exist
the seasons linger
or die too soon

I cannot see
the subtle changes
or hear the cadence

I feel the shift
and taste the residue
between our lips

and on the air
where
it also lingers

his passing
will bring the rain
but I covet him more

suspended as we are
between the seasons

and when the dusk
is touched by
the brows of moths
he will walk away

a harbinger
of autumn's end
before it has begun

while I drift
a river dream
over which
a new moon ascends...

an oar dips silently
and I shiver

River Dreamby `jade-pandora

Literature / Poetry / Romantic / General / Free Verse

©2008-2013 `jade-pandora

2/1/13: Featured here for February Member of the Month [link]

11/5/12 Featured here! [link]

9/17/12: Featured here! [link]

Since I began learning & writing Japanese short poetry (such as haiku & tanka) I find the lessons insinuate every other piece I write - especially longer poetry. Such is the case with "River Dream". Do you find the influence obvious because of the lack of caps & most punctuation, and if so, do you find this a distraction, or a way of allowing for a more esthetic flow?

Thank you for any insight you can give me with these questions, or anything that you might also wish to elaborate on.

~~mad 0 0~~

~~sad 0 0~~

~~fear 0 0~~

~~neutral 0 0~~

~chewyraezen Apr 15, 2013

beautifull!

Reply

`jade-pandora Apr 18, 2013

I'm grateful for your appreciation, thank you.

Reply

~chewyraezen Apr 18, 2013

i enjoy reading what you write. you are welcome.

Reply

`cality Mar 2, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

This is such a lovely, gentle poem.

Beautiful work.

Reply

`jade-pandora Mar 10, 2013

awww thank you so much, sweetheart

Reply

`cality Mar 10, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

You're welcome!

Reply

*DogmaticKerr Nov 18, 2012

Soft, calming, sensual... like a gentle drip-drip-drip of water.

Reply

`FuzzyHoser Nov 7, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

So very lovely, Jade.

Reply

`jade-pandora Nov 8, 2012

Thank you so much, Rachel -- that means a great deal to me.

Reply

`FuzzyHoser Nov 8, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

A pleasure, Jade!

Reply